


falling together now

by welcometonerdworld



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Fake Dating, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Tumblr Prompt, jack's homophobic aunt, zimbits - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-12
Updated: 2016-06-12
Packaged: 2018-07-14 15:54:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7178507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/welcometonerdworld/pseuds/welcometonerdworld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack's aunt doesn't believe he's gay and she's coming to visit - unfortunately he's told her he has a boyfriend when he's actually very much single.</p><p>Bitty just wants to survive his crush on Jack and really doesn't plan on fake-dating him at all, but things don't always go to plan.</p><p>(aka the zimbits fake dating fic from a prompt on tumblr)</p>
            </blockquote>





	falling together now

**Author's Note:**

> i was given this prompt on tumblr: ok so maybe jzimms comes back from break and he's like acting super weird and shitty picks up on it and turns out jackie may or may not have told his homophobic aunt he has a bf to piss her off but like now she's visiting.. and guess what? bitty's the only one free (not like shitty told e/one to act busy or anything). Like who am i kidding i'm no writer but i just really want a zimbits fake bf fic/hc, do what you will please
> 
> title is from sara haze's melt into you aka one of my fave zimbits songs it's so cute
> 
> have fun reading!!

“So…you want me to pretend to be your boyfriend?”

Bittle looks confused and worried and Jack feels _terrible_  but he’s kind of desperate.

“I - Bittle, you don’t have to. Of course. But if you could just help me out this one time I swear it won’t happen again, I know this is unnecessary and a dick move but…”

Jack trails off. They’re in the Haus kitchen; Jack had been quizzing Bittle on his notes, trying to pluck up the courage to ask him. He thinks it’s really fucking inconvenient that no one, not even Shitty, was volunteering to fake-date him for one stupid dinner with his stupid aunt. He guesses it makes sense because Ransom and Holster are always off together and Jack doesn’t know them as well as he knows Bittle. Chowder’s with Farmer and Jack’s pretty sure Nursey and Dex are in love with each other and just don’t know it yet. Shitty claims he’s ‘too busy studying, sorry brah, why don’t you ask Bitty?’ which Jack thinks is bullshit but - well.

He’s not exactly averse to the idea of dating Bittle for real, let alone pretending to.

“I’ll do it,” Bittle says, and Jack tries not to beam at him but finds himself grinning anyway.

“Thanks, _so much_ , Bittle,” he says, “I owe you one.”

“You owe me multiple, Mr. Zimmermann,” Bittle raises his eyebrows and points at the oven, “And you’re making dinner tonight.”

* * *

 

Bitty is really fucking nervous because he doesn’t know anything about Jack’s aunt apart from the fact that she was not pleased to find out that he’s gay. _Eric_  didn’t even know Jack was gay until the previous morning, when he was asked to fake-date him. He was a mixture of happy ( _if Jack’s gay does this mean I have a chance oh my Lord this boy is gay? I’m going on a date?_ ) and concerned ( _how am I going to get his aunt to like me why are we doing this I have a huge crush and it’s about to get worse_ ) and also completely confused ( _what about Camilla Collins did Jack date Kent Parson oh my god_ ).

Now, he’s ten minutes away from leaving the Haus and he’s half-dressed in jeans and an unbuttoned shirt. He does up the buttons and tries to get his hands to stop shaking, but honestly, Bitty’s never been on a date before. This is all new to him. Sure, he went to Winter Screw with that guy from the rugby team, but he hadn’t had a crush on him.

He _does_ have a crush on Jack. Maybe that’s a good thing - he’ll be a convincingly infatuated boyfriend - but he thinks it’s pretty clear that Jack isn’t interested in him that way.

Bitty takes a deep breath before heading out of his room, across the corridor. Jack’s door is open and the boy in question is on the phone when Bitty comes in.

“…ouais, j’sais, Papa,” Jack is saying in Québécois and Bitty waits, not understanding what he’s hearing. “Merci. Je dois - ouais. Bye.”

He hangs up and pockets his phone; looks at Bitty. They lock eyes and Eric doesn’t know how the hell he’s going to survive one night pretending to date this boy when he wishes _so badly_  that it was real.

Jack smiles. “Ready, Bittle?”

* * *

 

Jack is not ready. He’s not ready and they’re walking to the restaurant and Bittle is by his side and he thinks this is _the worst idea he’s ever had_. He’s considering just turning around but that would be giving in and maybe Jack’s too stubborn and a little bit of a masochist because he brushes his arm against Bittle’s and looks down at him. 

Bittle looks up, wide brown eyes so full of warmth that Jack feels a twinge of regret that this is all fake. He wishes, in that moment, that he’d asked Bittle out properly - he could have confessed that he liked him and maybe Bittle would have stood on his tiptoes and kissed him and they would have gone on a real date, just the two of them. 

Instead, they’re about to see Jack’s aunt and he’s pissed off because this is all her fault, really, if she hadn’t doubted the fact that he’s gay, he wouldn’t have said “I have a boyfriend, actually” in that challenging tone that should really only belong on the ice -

“You okay?”

Bittle’s voice cuts through Jack’s panicked haze and he manages a nod. “You remember our story, right?”

“Yeah,” says Bittle, “I asked you out after practice. We’ve liked each other ever since we started the same culture class.”

“Dating for a month,” Jack says and that just _hurts_ because the more he thinks about it, the more he thinks that actually, he’d really like to date Bittle for a lot longer than a month, without annoying family members and all the guilt that he’s drowning in right now.

* * *

 

The weirdest thing is that Jack’s aunt isn’t horrible. She’s shocked that Eric shows up hand in hand with Jack and that they refer to each other as boyfriends. She seems surprised that Eric’s on the hockey team and he only feels a little emotional when Jack says “Eric’s one of the best on the team; I play my best with him.”

It’s not bad. Bitty can almost imagine that this is real and that Jack’s introducing him to family before they go back to the Haus and curl up in bed together. Between the two of them they steer clear of any relationship details and end up discussing Jack’s aunt’s career as an actuary, which is just dull enough that Bitty can listen at the same time he over-analyses the way Jack’s leaning into him, how their feet are touching under the table even though they don’t have to be.

All in all, Jack’s aunt is a little bigoted but not a bad person, apart from the fact that her conversation is less than riveting. She doesn’t exactly take to Bitty but that’s okay, because Eric can see that she cares about her nephew and maybe her ignorance is part of some larger family issues that he doesn’t want to get involve in because they don’t mention Jack’s mom (her sister) even once.

“It was nice to meet you,” she says with a somewhat forced smile to Bitty. She hugs Jack and Bitty gives him a thumbs-up signal over her shoulder to which Jack smiles, but there’s a sort of pang in his chest when they leave hand in hand before letting go of each other just as Jack’s aunt turns the corner.

They get back to the Haus no later than ten o’clock, and it’s all very anticlimactic when Jack says, “Thanks for doing this, Bittle,” before they say goodnight. Eric goes to bed and squeezes Señor Bunny extra tight, trying to ignore the vivid memory of Jack’s hand in his and how it sounded when Jack called him Eric.

* * *

 

A week passes and Jack doesn’t forget about their fake-date, but he doesn’t think about it all the time either. _He doesn’t_.

(Maybe he’s a little preoccupied with the idea of taking Bittle out to a restaurant or maybe to a café to get one of those ridiculously calorific coffees Bittle likes so much and walking him back to the Haus and kissing on the doorstep and just _doing it properly._ But he’s not _always_  thinking about it.)

Jack has the distinct feeling he’s fucked something up and he doesn’t like it at all. He resolves to ask Bittle if everything’s okay after their class together only Bittle practically high-tails it out of there as soon as the lecture ends and Jack thinks about the past week and - that’s when he realises. 

He’s being avoided. Deliberately.

And it hurts more than it should because Jack really, really likes Bittle and their friendship was in a good place, or at least it had been before Jack came out to him. He wonders if maybe Bittle doesn’t think he’s actually gay and that’s why he’s been avoiding him, or maybe that he hurt Bittle’s feelings by wanting to fake-date him. Whatever it is, Jack feels like absolute shit for the rest of the day and spends his evening moping over the lack of fresh pie in the Haus because that means that Bittle isn’t home.

“Jack, Jack, Jack,” Shitty bursts into his room in the middle of Jack’s reverie (he’d been replaying the not-a-date in his mind and trying to look for _signs_  of weirdness). 

Jack looks up from the book he’d been trying and failing to concentrate on. Shitty plonks himself on the end of Jack’s bed like he has a hundred times before. “Have you seen Bittle?” Jack says before Shitty can start.

“No, I - wait, I was gonna ask you that.”

“What? You don’t know where he is?”

“Nah, bro, I figured he’d be with you. No one’s seen him since before your class.”

Jack knows he shouldn’t be worried - Bittle’s entitled to his space, he’s a grown man - but he is anyway. “Crisse, I’m gonna -” He puts down his book and shoves his feet into his trainers. “Bye, Shits.”

“Oh-kay.” Shitty’s frowning but Jack is already out the door. “See you later?”

* * *

 

Bitty’s at Faber, figure skates on and doing laps faster and faster until his thighs burn. He’s thinking about anything but Jack, anything but their stupid date and how Eric had wanted to hold his hand forever and maybe kiss him forever too. He thinks instead of his technique and their next game, only that sends him all the way back to Jack Zimmermann and his hockey playing and -

“Bittle!”

Eric hasn’t fallen on the ice in months and he doesn’t this time either, but he does stumble. He turns clumsily and looks in the direction of the shout and it’s Jack, coming onto the ice with a determined look on his face. 

“Hey, Jack,” Eric plays it cool. Or tries to. He knows he shouldn’t have run away from Jack straight after class but it was too painful, being near him but being so far away, knowing that he had a chance because Jack was gay too but knowing that Jack doesn’t like him that way. 

Eric knows he’s being selfish - Jack is a wonderful friend and he would take that over Jack being grumpy with him any day but _god_ , Eric thinks that he should be allowed to be selfish. Just this once.

“Bittle, I - are we okay? Like, since the fake-date thing last week - something’s been off. I don’t know if it’s something I did and - could you please just. Just say something.”

Jack looks so awkward, standing in front of him in a hoodie and jeans and hockey skates without a stick or his gear. Stumbling over his words.

Bitty sighs. “Everything’s good, Jack. I’m sorry I’ve been a little - distant, I just. It’s fine.”

Jack’s got two lines between his brows and Eric wants to reach up and smooth them over but he doesn’t. “It’s not fine,” Jack says abruptly, “I’m really sorry I made you go on that fake-date with me last week, it wasn’t cool and now everything’s weird -”

“Jack, you didn’t _make_  me do anything. I liked - I wanted to help.”

They’ve somehow skated closer together and Eric could take Jack’s hands now, if he wanted to. Jack’s looking straight at him and his eyes are so blue that they should be icy but Eric only sees warmth there, like Jack’s gaze is burning right into him -

“Bitty, I,” Jack hesitates and Eric doesn’t miss the use of the nickname. “I’m really glad you went on that fake-date with me.”

It’s a bad cliché but Eric’s chest feels tight in that moment. He wants to skate away but Jack puts his hands on his shoulders and Eric prepares himself mentally for the _we’re just friends_ moment or something when -

“I kind of wish you’d, uh. Go on a real date with me?”

Bitty’s heart just kind of - stops. It’s like he’s done a toe loop but he’s frozen in mid-air, mid-jump, high on this kind of elation that he can’t quite describe. 

He raises an eyebrow. “You _kind of wish_  I’d go on a date with you?”

Jack blushes. Honest-to-god colour, bright red; it flushes his cheeks and it’s so cute Eric thinks he’s going to melt onto the ice. “Uh. Oui - I mean, yes.”

“Mr. Zimmermann,” Eric says, and he’s smiling so wide now because Jack still looks concerned, like he might say no, “I kind of want to go on a real date with you too.”

Jack starts to mumble something like “That’s convenient” but gets cut off by Bitty, who’s dug his toe picks into the ice and is leaning up and Jack moves his hands from Bitty’s shoulders to his face and then - 

* * *

 

Jack doesn’t want to sound like a trashy romance novel but he can’t help it: kissing Bittle is everything he’d imagined it would be, only a thousand times better. 

Bitty is small but by no means soft, he kisses Jack like he means it, like they’re the only two people on the planet. Jack is so immersed in the sensation of his lips on Bitty’s that he forgets that they’re in Faber and that the coaches could find them like this. For once, he’s not thinking about hockey at all. 

The thing is that Bittle’s grinning really wide and that makes it difficult for Jack to kiss him because Bittle’s beaming so Jack’s smiling too and then they’re just standing in the middle of the rink, melting into each other. And Jack isn’t sure what he’s done to deserve this - he doesn’t even think he deserves someone as good as Eric Bittle - he must have done something pretty fucking awesome in a past life because Bittle’s hands are on his chest and they’re kissing again.

They walk back to the Haus together later on and they can’t hold hands but they’re brushing up against each other the entire way. He kisses Bittle against the closed door of the Haus when it’s clear that no one’s around to see and sends up a million thank-yous to whatever hockey gods have been watching over him because Jack has never felt so lucky. 

He even sends one over to his aunt because yeah, she’s annoying, but Jack can deal with it if it means he gets to kiss Bittle to oblivion.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on tumblr @hufflepuffbitty (also @lilypxtter) hmu to scream about these dorks :) pls give kudos/comment if u enjoyed! u u can also reblog on my tumblr http://hufflepuffbitty.tumblr.com/post/145809172645


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